The earthquake hit at6 19 with a jolt    People went running for the doorways    And for the next half minute it shook    Up on the 17th floor the sommelier wasopening the    wine    He knew the great hotel was solidly built    Still it must have been a miracle thatnothing got spilt       Terry O'Shea got up from the Chippendale chair    Talking on the telephone    Looking perplexed waving a hand in the air    In the great room all alone    Fifty years old today, a microdot billionaire    Putting on a party like a Hollywood guy    With all the food and wine that his money could buy       The band came in arguing as usual    About nothing in particular    It always seemed to be this way    Tuning up andputting out setlists    Of all the stupid songs that musicians hate to play    Still it could be better than usual    The food looked great and it was money not glory    So when the ]clock struck eight    They began the theme] from Love Story          Time went by with no one arriving at at all    It was just Terry and the pictures    of dead people frowning from the wall    They didn't look very pleased    It was completely clear nobody was coming    They were all staying home with their earthquake kits    Waiting for thge aftershocks to hit       Thirty decanters of wine sat ready to pout    1961 Margaux and Petrus and Chateau Latour    Swaying in unison    Lobstrer and caviar shrimp and salmon    They were all laid out with artistic flair    The waiters were already eyeing their share       Teryy got up and he said Enough    And told the band to stop playing that dreadful stuff    He made them all come over to the table    And gave them wine that they had never dreamt of    So they worked their way through the burgundy and port    And started to relax    They discovered thay had more in common than they thought    And so they went back       Over to the stand and started playing again    But this time differently    It got loud and louder and fairly insane    People heard it down in the street    It felt so good, they were smiling at each other    The waiters all ran out covering their ears    There was plaster from the ceiling on the crystal chandeliers       Terry was dancing like a madman andwaving his hands    At anything and everything    Kicking up the dust from the carpet and doing handstands    Cackling and yodeling    This was a birthday bash he hadn't anticipated    Spinning like a top in the middle of the room    While the hotel shook to a sonic boom       After a while he passed out cold on the floor    And dreamed revealing things    Then he didn't have computers anymore    or fawning underlings    He was running through the trees on a tropical isle    No more feeling tense    In a flower pattern shirt of quetionable style    It all made sense       The band went back to their homes in the Hollywood hills    Better than they'd ever felt    Waking up their sleep-addled wives with rambling tales    It didn't go down very well    But as a legacy they called a band meeting    And decided they were going to give up playing covers    From that day on they got along with one anothoer       Terry woke up and strange as the story may seem    Though he felt terrible    He found withthe dawn he could still remember his dream    So ge just fell away    Nobody's seen him since    But I like to think of him    Sitting on a beach like Gaugin wearing a smile    Waiting for the brown-eyed girl, she'll be there in a while    Maybe thinking back now and then to a long ago time    The night that the band got the wine    The night that the band got the wine